Bernardo Karate's 25th Anniversary

The King Street Years:

As I mentioned last month, my first full time school was located on King St. across from the Covent Garden Market. I opened the school with Ken Tallack as my partner. Ken operated a karate school called the Martial Arts Fitness Centre. This King St. location was affiliated for advertising and promotional purposes only. During the renovation period on King Street, Ken’s existing school on Elias Street was destroyed by a fire. As he looked for a new location {which turned out to be on Dearness Drive, 5 units down from our current South school location} we shared the King Street location for classes. The classes we offered were quite different. We did not share the same style of karate and our teaching methods were different. This contrasting style brought over to our school, Sempai Dennis McFadden.

Sempai Dennis was a student at the Martial Arts Fitness Centre, but his two daughters took classes from me. Both of his daughters were very talented and dedicated and received their Black Belts. Sempai Lee Ann just received her 4th degree last year. Sempai Dennis would watch the girls do classes and seemed quite interested in learning, but I thought he still must be happy taking lessons elsewhere. Then one day he approached me and asked me if he could join the school, but he was not interested in tournaments or competing like his daughters. I told him that if he wanted to learn I would teach him. I later found out that he had wanted to join earlier because classes looked to be much more fun and motivating but felt an obligation to stay with his initial school. Then one day he inquired about his grading. At his old school, students were tested and the results were not posted until the following week. It had been 3 weeks since his test and he asked if he had passed or failed. He was told that he had passed and the results were not posted yet. On his way out of the school, Sempai Dennis was going down the stairs a Black Belt student threw him his new belt and said congratulations. This unfortunate event, I am sure the Black Belt would take back, was my gain. Sempai Dennis was and still is an excellent student, an excellent instructor and one of the reasons we are celebrating 25 years of success.

One thing not many people know about Sempai Dennis is that as a kyu belt he was a very good fighter. He had these red gloves we nicknamed the “cherry bombs”. Sempai Dennis was very effective at using his long reach and hitting people with his backfist. He would fight you very patiently and draw you closer then “bang” all you would see was a red glove in your face.

During these King Street years many of my core group of students started training with me. Sempai Mark Anderson, my first student to start with me from white belt, went on to receive his Black Belt and became my program director at the school. Other students included Jeffrey Muir (now a 5th degree Black belt); Ron Bowers who would later open the Crediton school; John Marshall, who later became a partner in two other London locations with me; Jamie Vandermoer who would start the Tour Canada martial arts circuit; Russ Taylor who became my brother-in-law and Brent Beatty.

Brent was one of the top sport karate fighters ever. He was a light heavyweight fighter that possessed the quickness and speed of a lightweight. When people talk about the best fighters they ever saw in the sport his name is always near the top. I remember him from King Street. I was teaching class and Mark Anderson was working with a group of students. After a few minutes Mark came over to me and asked me to look at this kid in front of the mirror. The kid was pretending to fight someone throwing double roundhouse kicks, hook kicks and spin kicks. What made this so memorable was that no one had shown him any of these kicks; he was just watching the higher belts and it was only his 2nd class. Needless to say, Brent left a huge impression. I should note that although Brent was a gifted athlete, his success in martial arts was a combination of talent, dedication, hard work and support from his family. Although not many students have such an initial impact, I have seen many students who process natural talent but lack the drive to be successful.

During these years I attended many local tournaments. Just prior to opening this school my training was dedicated to Kickboxing. I would drive to Kitchener 3 times a week with Leo Loucks to train with his coach Jimmy Fields. Leo Loucks had started karate with me under Harold Warden (who was my first instructor). Leo was six years older than me and I used him as a role model. When I had the opportunity to train with him again I jumped at the chance. His coach Jimmy Fields is one of Canada’s most respected kickboxing instructors. His influence on how I teach is still evident today. During these early years, Kickboxing was very popular. I remember being on a fight card with Leo as the headliner, at the old London ice house and it was filled to the rafters.

Unfortunately kickboxing was banned in Ontario shortly after I started. With little chance of getting regular fights I went back to sport karate. I started travelling to local events with my students. These students quickly started to earn a reputation of excellence. By travelling all over Ontario, Michigan and New York my exposure to other styles and techniques grew. I incorporated elements that made my system stronger. I was always open to new ideas and wanted my students to have every possible advantage. This success led to a reputation that my school only did competitions. I would have people call and ask about lessons then ask if they “had to compete?” Just like today, only a small percentage of students did competitions; it was just a situation where we won so much that it seemed like we had 10 times the number of competitors there.

After two years, I ended my partnership with Ken and moved out of the King Street location to 265 Maitland Street. This would be my home for the next 12 years. It would also be the first dojo for many of our current Instructors.

Next month, I will share stories from the years spent at our Maitland Street dojo.

Shihan Michael Bernardo